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October 27, 2006

Montpelier, VT co-op supermarket

So you want a co-op supermarket downtown...

Good neighborhood supermarkets are hard to come by. Trader Joe's and Whole Foods are the de facto choices by the downtown crowd, though the former has a limited selection and the latter caters to an upper class income. The most progressive neighborhoods in forward-thinking cities like Madison WI, Burlington VT, Cambridge MA and Ann Arbor MI have it figured out - co-op supermarkets.

Co-op cafe As you can see (above), co-ops have evolved - they're organized via grassroots efforts, but don't look like grassroots efforts. In fact, they're sharp-looking, well-managed, and price competitive because they follow the mass customization/crowdsourcing/beta community model of future patrons organizing to design and develop the grocery they want. In fact, as a result, most of them have built-in cafes (right) and community bulletin boards.

The question then becomes, how does one start a co-op supermarket? The answer is with the Food Co-op 500 (perhaps a play on the Fortune 500), cooperative effort to help establish a total of 500 co-op supermarkets in 10 years (there are 300 today).

The outline of the development guide can be found here, based on:
1. Four organizing principles:
The 'Four Cornerstones' of Vision, Talent, Capital and Systems.
2. Three stages of development:
Organizing, Feasibility and Planning, and Implementation.
3. Two sources of funding:
- $10,000 matching Seed Fund grant for the first stage of development.
- $25,000 matching Sprout Fund loan for the second and third stages of development.

Finally, you can 'find a co-op supermarket near you' with the Cooperative Grocer Directory... and if there isn't one, you now have an idea of how to solve that!

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October 26, 2006

Philadelphia

Philadelphia's 'One Big Campus' to attract/retain jobs, creatives

Pennsylvania hasn't exactly been at the top of the list in states that attract knowledge workers. However, Collegia, which works with colleges and communities to attract and retain top student talent, is helping them change that.

Collegia president Todd Hoffman, interviewed at Smart City, puts it in perspective, "Quality of life is more important now than ever. It's really the jobs that are migrating to where the students want to be - they seem to have the upper hand in most places."

One such program Collegia has helped implement is One Big Campus to market Philadelphia as, well, one big campus, with a team effort on providing each student with as much access as possible to other university campuses as well as the city itself, via hotel discounts, interactive websites, magazines, and the biggest event of all - a late September kick-off party with a downtown concert, introducing students to the transportation system, museums, employers, and a Career Philly program to generate internships, all to connect them emotionally to the City.

Who's involved in that? The Knowledge Industry Partnership that administers the program; the mayor; the head of tourism; and the director of economic development. What're the results since the program started three years ago? Admissions and enrollment up 10% (2002-2005), and 65% want to stay in Philadelphia after they graduate in 2005 vs 50% in 2002. However, the actual retention rate hasn't changed yet - once again, it sounds like they could use a mass customization program for building the places graduates really want, like the beta community.

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October 25, 2006

Linking

If there was ever one definitive graphic, this is it

The table is from Linking the New Economy to the Livable Community, published by Collaborative Economics, sponsored by the James Irvine Foundation.

It clearly outlines how our one-size-fits-all mass production economy is evolving toward a customer-driven mass customization model based on choice, adaptability, distinctiveness, vital centers and quality of life, and even better, how communities will begin to reflect that. You can also see why many of the unique, 'customized', human-scale neighborhoods built in the 1920s happen to be among the most desirable today.

So to answer the oft-asked question, what is a cool town? It's about everything in the top row, in a time where the last vestiges of what's represented in the second row are still stuck in the last column. Unfortunately, real estate (ie 'place') is the slowest industry to change in the evolution of an economy.

That's why CoolTown Studios only works with the fastest.

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October 24, 2006

Piazza for Gansevoort Plaza

A NYC 'beta community' to build a piazza

What's so hard about building a piazza? That's the general thinking of the creative class, and tired of waiting for non-creative City and real estate development leaders to probably never invest in such a thing, the local creatives in Manhattan decided to do it themselves.

How did this Gansevoort Project (the name of the neighborhood, aka the Meatpacking District) start? A neighborhood preservationist and restauranteur got together with their fellow business owners and residents, brought in a facilitator, Project for Public Spaces, and planned around the common vision of "If you plan a city for cars and traffic you get cars and traffic. If you plan for people and places, you get people and places." You can track their findings here.

There is indeed hope, what with the Dept. of Transportation commissioner (Iris Weinshall) committing to "create public plazas in neighborhoods in all five boroughs,"... "These open spaces will make walking more enjoyable, preserve neighborhood character, and can serve as the heart of a neighborhood through which all activity can pulse." Transportation officials said nothing of the sort ten short years ago, even five.

The group is now discussing implementation with city officials. The best news is that the "organizers stressed that the community, not the local politicians, would guide the decision-making process." Now that's what a beta community is all about.

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October 23, 2006

A night in Adams Morgan

A slice of creative class nightlife

We know there are studies (Competing in the Age of Talent) that correlate population diversity to a city's economic growth; that young adults create jobs and are a key source of the creative class' job base of designers, scientists, engineers and artists, and that nightlife is a key determinant in choosing a city...

So, what is an example of this nightlife that everyone's talking about? Washington Post writer Ellen McCarthy finds out what that means in Washington DC, providing a benchmark for other cities and towns to ask, "Do we have nightlife like this to attract or keep the creative class?" Ellen's adventures include:

- A night out at a salsa club with a couple of Latino women in their late twenties, one single, another a single mom.
- Bollywood2Night with a 23-year-old Indian engineer, with music from Indian films followed by a DJ spinning some bhangra.
- Karaoke night with a Japanese family, except the parents are in their late 50s and their sons are in their early 20s, plus 10 of their friends.
- Persian pop star Arash's concert with three Persian teens, one of many ongoing Persian events in the area.
- A regular experience of contemporary music and dancing at an Ethiopian restaurant/club with a 22-year old Ethiopian man and his friend.
- A single 32-year-old Brazilian man's weekly outlet at a Caribbean club that makes him feel at home.

How does your city/town stack up?

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